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THE THREE DIMENSIONS OF EQUANIMITY
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had accompanied Sudarshan to Lord Mahavira. The highway was thrown open to the people
The Lord vias non-violence personified He was all goodwill and compassion "His very proximity took one's cruelty away. Arjuna's heart was once more tender with love As the dark and moon-lit fortnights occur alternately, so do the mental frames of man The minds overpowered with darkness with light dim their consciousness The minds dominated with light overpower the dark and brighten up their consciousness The Lord filled the consciousness of Arjuna with light The torch of equanimity lent his heart a soft undying glow Now he was a monk
To the common people it was incredible that within a day a devil-incarnate should become a saint The conversion was too dramatic to be true It is not commonly known that such changes do occur. Radical changes must occur in a dramatic manner. And still the ordinary folk would not accept a dramatic occurrence. Those who had suffered at his hands refused to recognise his sanctity. I
Since it was the Lord who had initiated Arjuna into eguanimity, the latter attained higher and higher elevation He was utterly indifferent to honour and disgrace, gain and loss, life and death, pleasure and pain etc
Sometime later Monk Arjuna went on his round to beg meals in the town of Rajgriha. Families woulo shout-This man killed my father He killed my brother, Here goes my son s murderermor mother's, wife's or friend's Some would abuse him, some taunted him, some reprimanded and other's beat him It was obviously the nemesis visiting him Arjuna realised it full well Once he would eat without water to drink. Another time it was water that served him as a meal However he was apathetic to such bodily wants Equanimity was his forte Equanimity as reflected in his conduct won over the people in due course Violence had been cleansed by an ablution into non-violence 1 i 'Antgadadsco', 6
